Reincarnate
by BMT and SuperMoose
Summary: Is the similarity between their names the only reason Ukitake pays attention to Toshiro? Or could the truth lie in the past? By BlackMarketTrombones.


"Why are you drinking already, Shunsui?" Ukitake asked with the air of one who knows he is fighting a losing battle. "We're just about to eat."

"I'm getting warmed up, Juushiro," the inebriated captain of eighth company explained, oozing charm from every orifice. "One can't enjoy a good meal without a little drink beforehand."

"You're on your third bottle," Ukitake said, feeling the urge to argue his point despite the fact that he knew it would get him nowhere. "That's hardly a little drink."

"In your opinion, perhaps, my dearest Juushiro, but for a seasoned sake connoisseur such as myself, this is hardly enough to wet my lips." He waved a forth bottle in front of his companions face. "Would you care to join me?"

"No thank you," Ukitake insisted firmly, pushing the bottle of sake away. "Unohana's orders, so no slipping me any while we're eating."

"Really, Juushiro, would I do something like that?" he asked with an expression of perfect, wide-eyed innocence. Ukitake was unaffected.

He was about to respond with a sarcastic – but true – remark when he spotted a familiar face.

"Toshiro!" The silver-haired captain looked up and an irritated expression flickered briefly across his face before being banished by his usual impassive air. Ukitake hurried over to him with a friendly smile on his face.

"Hello, Captain Ukitake," his said, emphasizing the title slightly.

Undeterred, Ukitake brushed off the cold greeting and continued smiling warmly. "Please, call me Juushiro. Have you eaten yet? Shunsui and I were just going to dinner and I was wondering if you'd like to join us."

"No thank you, Captain," he responded coolly, turning to leave. "I have a previous engagement."

"Ah, perhaps next time, then," Ukitake called out to his retreating back. He kept smiling until the snowy hair was well out of sight; then his face fell and he sighed.

"Sometimes I wonder why you try so hard," Shunsui commented offhandedly, taking another swig of sake.

--

It was very, _very_ late – or perhaps it was early. Ukitake was too muddled to care about specifics. His throat was dry and he had a headache; he was sure Shunsui had spiked his drink when he wasn't watching.

Shunsui was worse off. It took a great deal of alcohol to get a perpetual drunk such as himself wasted, but he'd managed it somehow. Despite his drunken state, he'd even been able to shove the bill off on Ukitake. It had been considerable.

Now he had one arm slung around Ukitake's shoulders and was dragging him off to goodness _knows_ where. It did not help his headache that he was singing his version of "Tip-Toe Through the Tulips" – which had three hundred seventy-two verses that he had made up in a similarly inebriated state and was in no way similar to the original – at the top of his lungs.

"Shunsui." Ukitake interrupted the verse about how he had been stung by a bee while smelling a particularly fragrant yellow tulip. "Where are we going?"

"Home o'course!" Shunsui bellowed, beginning to hiccup. "Where else hic would w'go? C'mon, J'shiro!"

"But Shunsui! This isn't the way to eighth division!" It was no use. He resumed his ballad where he left off and was dead to all reason. Ukitake could only allow himself to be lead helplessly and hope his companion passed out soon.

They were moving farther and farther from where they wanted to be. Having completed his song, Shunsui was energetically extolling the benefits of sake over Western wine. The road turned to a dirt path and buildings became scarcer before disappearing altogether, replaced by the shadowed branches of the forest. Ukitake vaguely recognized his surroundings, but he could not remember from where.

All at once, Shunsui fell silent. Ukitake began trying to convince him to turn around, but he raised a finger to his lips and said, "Shhh. He'll hear you."

He pointed, and a sudden bone-chilling wind blew from that direction. Ukitake turned slowly, feeling with a strange feeling that was a mixture of nostalgia and dread.

A familiar sight greeted him, though it was something he had not seen for centuries. The thick mass of trees ended abruptly a few feet from a shallow river. A few chunks of ice that must have floated down from the mountains drifted past, toppling over the edge of a waterfall several meters away. It was not a very tall waterfall, he knew, but there were a number of rocky protrusions sticking out along the way, making for a short but deadly fall.

In the very center of the river was a smooth white stone, glistening like ice in the moonlight. A snowy white birch tree struggled to grow on it. It had not been easy, he remembered, trying to plant a tree on bare rock; maybe that was why it was still so small and scraggly, even after all these thousands of years.

A young man sat at the base of the tree, leaning against the coarse bark and gazing up through the bare branches at the full moon. The light glinted off his blond hair, so pale it was almost white, and he sighed so deeply it could be heard even from where they stood.

"Mizukai," someone whispered, and Ukitake realized it was himself who breathed that ancient name like a long-forgotten charm. Then the boy's head fell forward onto his chest and he realized that the hair was silver, not blond, and that it was Toshiro.

"Sometimes," said Shunsui without a hint of a slur in his voice, "I wonder why you try so hard." He glanced at Toshiro, who appeared to have fallen asleep. "But other times, it's blindingly clear. You know you couldn't have done anything about Mizukai, Juushiro."

"But that's the thing, Shunsui," he said miserably. "I could have."

"You can't change the past, Juushiro." He sounded remarkably sober for someone who was supposedly smashed.

"I _know_ that," Ukitake insisted. "I just…"

There was a soft thump as Shunsui succumbed to the alcohol in his system and sank to the ground, snoring quietly.

--

_He ran faster than he had ever run before. He shunpo'd ahead of the others, ignoring their cries for him to slow down, desperate to make it in time yet knowing that he would be too late._

_He came to a halt just at where the thick mass of trees ended at the riverbank. A few chunks of ice from the mountains toppled over the waterfall. A white rock glistened like ice under the full moon, but unlike the previous times he had come, no one was there._

"_Mizukai!" he cried, leaping onto the stone. "Mizukai!" No one answered._

_A feeling of dread settled in the pit of his stomach as he peered over the edge of the waterfall. It was not very tall, but there were a number of rocky protrusions sticking out of the Cliffside, making for a short – but deadly – fall._

_He spotted something washed up on the bank at the bottom and, hoping against hope, shunpo'd down next to it. A young man, hardly more than a boy, lay face-up in an inch of water. His pale blond, almost white floated eerily around his blank face, glinting in the moonlight. Tendrils of red swirled in the water around him, oozing from where his zanpaku-to protruded from his stomach. His blue-green eyes were lifeless and dull._

"_Oh, Mizukai," he whispered helplessly, clumsily feeling for a nonexistent pulse. The others were arriving now; he could hear them at the top of the waterfall. One of them landed next to him._

"_Wh-what happened, Juushiro?" he stammered, stunned._

"_I killed him, Shunsui!" he cried wildly, barely aware of what he was saying. "It's all my fault!"_

--

Ukitake woke in a cold sweat just as the first rays of morning illuminated the horizon. He had not slept very long.

"A dream…" he mumbled, relieved. "Or a memory." He decided it did not matter which.

He stood up and started rummaging around in the back of his closet. When he found the dusty, little-used item he was searching for, he quietly snuck away. There was plenty of time before he had to be at the office, and there was something he needed to do.

--

Half of the sky was still in shadow when he arrived, and the moon was shining dimly, struggling against the encroaching light of day. He was still there, leaning motionlessly against the birch tree. Ukitake hesitated, unsure of himself now, but the sleeping captain the sleeping captain began to stir into wakefulness as the sunlight struck his eyes and he had no time to be timid.

"Ah, you come here too, Toshiro?" Ukitake asked, swallowing his trepidation and smiling as he stepped forward.

"Captain Ukitake…" He must have been muddled with sleep because the surprise showed plainly on his face – Ukitake thought it was a rather adorable expression – for a few moments. The he snapped out of it and donned his customary icy demeanor. "I… do come here sometimes. I was not aware that anyone else knew of this place." His calculating teal gaze flicked down to what Ukitake held and he said, "An incense burner, Captain?"

"Yes." He jumped onto the stone and knelt next to Toshiro. "It has been too long since I last visited; it's gotten dusty."

"Did… someone die here?" That was unusual. Toshiro generally went out of his way to avoid getting caught up in affairs that did not concern him. He must still be half-asleep.

Ukitake sighed. "Yes. It was a long time ago, back in my Academy days." He smiled broadly, falsely. "You look a great deal like him. I was surprised, at first, when I saw you here." His expression remained the same, but it was apparent that his cheeriness was all a façade. "He… was the first person that I ever killed." He laughed. "Perhaps that was a bit melodramatic, but…" His face fell. "I allowed him to die."

Toshiro showed no indication of curiosity, so Ukitake turned and lit the incense. Abruptly, the younger captain stood.

"I should leave," he said almost awkwardly. "I wouldn't want to impose."

"Not at all," Ukitake assured him. "I'm sure Mizukai wouldn't mind. You're very similar to him, you know. Almost like a kindred spirit."

Something flickered in Toshiro's stoic eyes, but it was gone before Ukitake could tell what it was. He remained standing but made no further move to leave, and a thick, stifling silence descended upon the pair as each waited for the other to speak.

Surprisingly, it was Toshiro who made the first move.

"Did you… know this Mizukai well?" he asked awkward, unsurely.

He was surprised by the answer. "Not hardly," Ukitake replied, smiling that false grin again. "I barely knew him at all."

"But you knew him well enough to think I am similar to him."

Ukitake had to smile at his awkward attempts at conversation. "Oh yes," he explained. "Very much so. And more than just in appearance too. Your temperaments are nearly identical. He even had an ice-based zanpaku-to." He gazed distantly at the sky where night turned to day. "He was lonely, terribly lonely, and I didn't notice. I always thought – I mean, we _all_ thought this – if he wanted company, he would seek it but he was always so…" He struggled for the right word. "…Aloof. Cold. Unapproachable. I didn't see it until it was too late." He sighed. "He committed seppuku and threw himself over this very waterfall. I've never been able to forgive myself."

Toshiro was silent for a moment before responding. "It seems to me," he said slowly, "that he was more at fault than you."

Ukitake smiled humorlessly. "Shunsui has tried for centuries to convince me of that. He has not, thus far, been successful." He brushed his hand against the ivory bark of the birch tree. "He liked birch trees, I think. That's why I planted this here, in his favorite spot, in some vain attempt to make up for letting him die. He liked to sit in them. Sometimes it was hard to see him among the branches, what with his white hair and uniform." His smile became a bit more genuine. "And he loved sweets. I should have brought some for him, but I didn't think of it…"

There was another silence, but it didn't feel awkward like before. Again, it was Toshiro who broke it.

"It's getting late," he said, staring at the illuminated sky. "We should go back before our subordinates start to worry, Captain Ukitake."

"Please, call me Juushiro," he said warmly, standing.

"You're leaving your incense," Toshiro observed.

"Hmmm? So I am." Ukitake made to retrieve it but stopped. "I think I'll leave it here," he said. "At least for now." He turned back to his companion and said, "Perhaps you would like to join Shunsui and myself for dinner later this week? He pinned the bill on me last night, and I fully intend to return the favor."

Again that flicker of emotion that Ukitake couldn't quite place flashed across Toshiro's eyes. "Perhaps," he said coolly as they walked into the dawn.


End file.
